14 September 2007

The William Blake Archive is pleased to announce the publication of an electronic edition of copy T of Songs of Innocence and of Experience. Copy T is in the British Museum and, like all the illuminated books in the Archive, its texts and images are fully searchable and are supported by our Inote and ImageSizer applications.

Copy T is eclectic, aesthetically and bibliographically. It consists of impressions from a late copy of the combined Songs, an early copy of Songs of Experience, and an early copy of Songs of Innocence. Thirty-eight of its 54 impressions were printed in orange ink in 1818, given frame lines, numbered in red ink, and elaborately finished in watercolors and pen and ink. They were printed in the same style and color and on the same paper as The Marriage of Heaven and Hell copy G, The Book of Urizen copy G, and Visions of the Daughters of Albion copies O and P, which are all in the Archive. Twelve of its impressions in Experience were color printed with substantial pressure from both levels of the plate in yellow ochre, green, red, and blue colors and inks in 1794 and left unnumbered. Four Innocence impressions (plates 6, 7, 19, and 24), printed on both sides of the leaf in raw sienna or yellow ochre, were extracted from Innocence copy F, printed in 1789.

The twelve color-printed impressions in Experience were originally printed in a set of seventeen, along with those now in Songs copies F, G, and H. All four sets are missing plates 39, 44, 45, and 48, which suggests that these plates may not yet have been executed and Experience was printed while still in progress. If so, then the Experience impressions in Songs copy T were printed before those in copies B-E. Though seemingly incomplete, the Experience impressions in Songs copy T as originally printed, as well as those in Songs copies F, G, and H, appear to have been intended as an autonomous publication. At any rate, there are no extant sets of Innocence impressions printed in this color-printing style, Songs copies G and H were never combined with Innocence impressions, and Songs copy F was joined with a copy of Innocence by someone other than Blake (see the Archive update for 9 March 1999). And someone other than Blake formed the present day Songs copy T, using a late copy of Songs to complete a seemingly incomplete copy of Experience.

With this publication, the Blake Archive leaves the Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities, University of Virginia, and moves its headquarters to the University Libraries, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Our relationship with the Institute was essential to the Archive's development for well over a decade. The transition to North Carolina was a complex challenge that demanded sustained effort and attention on all sides. We are especially grateful for the expertise of our new partners in the Carolina Digital Library.

The Archive will now begin a new publishing schedule with the assistance of our new project manager, Ashley Reed, and technical editor, Will Shaw. For a complete list of the Archive's current staff, see http://www.blakearchive.org/blake/credits.html.

As always, the William Blake Archive is a free site, imposing no access restrictions and charging no subscription fees. The site is made possible by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the continuing support of the Library of Congress, and the cooperation of the international array of libraries and museums that have generously given us permission to reproduce works from their collections in the Archive.

Morris Eaves, Robert N. Essick, and Joseph Viscomi, editors
William Shaw, technical editor, Ashley Reed, project manager
The William Blake Archive